In the fields of color copying and color printing, it is known to convert red, blue, and green (R,B,G) output data from a scanner into corresponding cyan, yellow, magenta and black (C,Y,M,K) data and then to further process and refine this C,Y,M,K data before using same to drive a color printer. One such conversion system is described, for example, in U.S. Pat. No. 4,930,018 of C. S. Chan et al entitled "Method and System For Enhancing the Quality of Both Color and Black and White Images Produced by Ink Jet Printers", assigned to the present assignee and incorporated fully herein by reference. Other related types of color conversion systems are disclosed in Clark et al U.S. Pat. No. 4,477,833 Yoshida et al U.S. Pat. No. 4,719,490, and Myers U.S. Pat. No. 4,751,490, all incorporated herein by reference.
Using the color conversion technique described and claimed in my above co-pending application, it becomes necessary to employ a large and complete color gamut in order to generate a data bank or memory known as a "look up table" or LUT. This look up table is in turn stored in the memory of a computer and then used by the computer for converting the received red, blue, and green data to cyan, magenta, yellow, and black data which is in turn used to drive a color printer This complete color gamut should be prepared on the same type of print media and using the same type of ink, pen, drop volume and dye loading as is expected to be used by the color printer or copier under control of an image scanner. This operation is necessary in order to provide the best possible color match between the hardcopy output of the color printer and the scanned color image which is converted to C,Y,M & K data for driving the color printer. A color mismatch or color distortion will occur between the colors in the scanned image and the colors in the hardcopy output of the color printer when there is a change over time in any one of the above original parameters of print media, ink, dye, pen type, or drop volume. Furthermore, the above color mismatch or distortion will also be caused by changes in calibration which may occur over time to the separate calibration systems which are, respectively, part of the image scanner and a densitometer which is used to convert the color gamut into its R,G, & B components.
One solution to the above problem of color mismatch is to continuously update the full color gamut every time there is a change in one of the above five print parameters or in the calibrations of the scanner and densitometer. However, such a continuous updating of the large scale color gamut is very expensive and time consuming for reasons described in more detail below.